A tale of two Umass buildings

Tilson Farm Steam Plant (also called "Paradis Boiler Plant" located near Orchard Hill)




The new state of the art co-generation plant on Mullins Way, using low sulphur diesel fuel, natural gas and effluent (gray water) from the Amherst Waste water Plant located nearby produces both heat and electricity.
Original coal fired steam plant built in the late 1940s; slated to be replaced in 1974 by Tilson Farm.

In fact, the old warhorse coal plant was under pressure from the EPA to shut down in the early 1970s so perhaps that urgency pushed Umass officials to become reckless in bringing on-line the new Tilson Farm plant too early. The coal fired steam plant, continued operation until about two years ago.



View old power plant in a larger map
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The difference between the new $138 million Umass co-generation heating/electrical plant on Mullins Way and the old $9 million Tilson Farm steam plant is as stark and simple as a light switch: one switched on and it worked, the other turned on and did not.

The Ward Commission, charged with investigating public building contracts during the 1970s, concluded that the Tilson Farm steam plant fiasco was an all too typical byproduct of the greed and corruption ingrained in the system of awarding state government building contracts. Essentially the foxes had free rein in the henhouse with little to no oversight.

According to an abstract of the Ward Commission published in the Boston Globe (1/3/1981):

"The $9 million steam power plant is a white elephant - now standing idle because the 1.5-mile pipeline designed to carry steam to the campus contains irreparable defects caused by backward operation during startup. After $96,492 paid to contractors produced neither a solution of the problem nor even identification of its cause, workers renovated an old plant at a cost of over $2 million. Meanwhile, attempts to "mothball" the new plant resulted in corrosion of valves and pipes."

The "backward operation" probably seemed like a clever cost saving idea at the time: pulling steam into the plant from the older one located 1.5 miles away to heat it during the first winter of operation.

Attorney General Francis Bellotti eventually won a $970,000 lawsuit against the building designers but by then the $9.3 million steam plant was abandoned. A "Building Condition Report" done by staff at the office of Administration and Finance dated 5/26/09 estimates $5 million in demolition costs for the 19,000 square foot plant, although no such action is imminent.

A recent inside tour shows the derelict four story building to be remarkably well preserved:












Perhaps a lasting legacy of the powerless powerplant is reflected in the shiny exterior of the new co-generation plant built 35 years later. As State Senator Stan Rosenberg, President Pro Tem of the Massachusetts Senate (D-Amherst) points out: state officials had learned a hard, expensive lesson.

Inside the Ghost Ship

Like a seafarers oft-told tale about an abandoned ship discovered on the high seas years after disappearing with everything aboard still intact except for the entire crew; or a once in a generation heat wave lowers the levels at the Quabbin Reservoir enough to expose the abandoned remains of what were once sleepy little towns forcefully abandoned to make room for one of the largest man made water supplies in the country, the Umass Tillson Farm Steam Plant is every bit as spooky.

Translucent panels on the upper floors allow sunlight to naturally filter in reflecting off a hive of interconnected aluminum pipes most with a layer of dust but still seemingly brand new. The 19,000 sqare foot 4 floor heating plant would normally be a busy noisy environment. Now it is all but empty--and deathly quiet.

Built for $9.3 million in tax dollars and first tested in 1973 the oil fired steam heating plant never threw a BTU of heat. According to an abstract of the Ward Commission tasked with investigating corruption in pubic buildings during the 1970s published in the Boston Globe (1/3/1981):

"The $9 million steam power plant is a white elephant - now standing idle because the 1.5-mile pipeline designed to carry steam to the campus contains irreparable defects caused by backward operation during startup. After $96,492 paid to contractors produced neither a solution of the problem nor even identification of its cause, workers renovated an old plant at a cost of over $2 million. Meanwhile, attempts to "mothball" the new plant resulted in corrosion of valves and pipes."

And a recent Umass "Building Condition Report" pegs the cost of demolition for the idle plant at $5 million.

Yet another firefight

Venerable Amherst Town Meeting will discuss as part of "capital items" $15,000 for the purchase of a Thermal Imaging camera. The hand held cameras allow firefighters to essentially "see" through dense smoke.

The current cameras are ten years old and beyond their rated lifespan--especially considering their routine work environment.

I vividly recall pulling into my Health Club on Saturday morning December 4, 1999 as an Amherst Firefighter was leaving my facility. I simply could not believe that Worcester--the second largest city in Mass--did not have thermal imaging cameras in their arsenal of standard firefighting equipment.

He just shook his head, despondently.

At the height of the Worcester cold storage fire (12/3/99) a commander on the scene issued a desperate dispatch for any surrounding departments to provide thermal imaging cameras as now six of Worcester's finest were unaccounted for in an intense conflagration at an abandoned structure later dubbed "the building from Hell."

They all perished in perhaps the worst state public safety tragedy in history--only eclipsed by the horrific event of 9/11 almost two years later.

A little before that fateful day AFD Chief Keith Hoyle had started a private fundraising endeavor to purchase two thermal imaging cameras (about $15,000 each) for our town fire department and had already garnered $5,000 pledges from Amherst College and Hampshire College.

I immediately volunteered my services and formed the "Eyes of Life" committee to help raise the funds necessary to purchase two of the cameras--target goal $30,000. And I figured with Amherst and Hampshire Colleges on board, Umass should be a slam dunk for an equal amount, thus getting us about half-way there.

Wrong.

Umass pleaded poverty even though at the time they were costing the town over $100,000 in fire/ambulance runs to the campus with no compensation. I did the usual: wrote a scathing Amherst Bulletin column, numerous Letters to the Editor, even took out small ads trying to embarrass the areas largest employer into helping out.

By then dozens and dozens of individual contributors had donated enough to buy a camera--but we still had a fairly long way to go for the two.

Ron Hall, my favorite long-time news journalist with forty years experience at WHMP radio called me at the Club excitedly saying Umass had just issued a press release about their $10,000 donation towards the second camera. I instantly called Umass News Services to get a copy.

On careful reading turns out the "donation" consisted of a marketing coupon--"buy one get the second at half price." And Umass was not buying one or contributing anything towards the half price camera (which was rebuilt). I was insulted, but even more than that--incensed.

Especially when the Chancellor denigrated the numerous folks who actually donated money by bragging the coupon was worth more than "mere money." Well gee there Chancellor Scott, if you can describe money as "mere" than why not come up with some it yourself?

I filed a warrant article with Town Meeting to thank Amherst and Hampshire Colleges while criticizing Umass for basically being cheapskates. Meanwhile the state appropriated money for public safety emergency equipment bringing Amherst $10,000 in a grant to help defray most of the cost of a camera.

Umass did agree to front the $10,000 as the coupon could only be used by them (although I came close to pulling off the deal without the Umass coupon) and I agreed to reimburse them from the "Eyes of Life" fund.

In the end the "Eyes of Life" campaign raised just over $33,000 plus the original $10,000 Chief Hoyle had secured from the two private colleges. And Amherst was safer for it.


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READER SEES SMOKE
RE. “USEFULNESS U” [Around the Pond, Fall 2000]: The press release distributed by UMass news services almost required a thermal-imaging camera to see through the smoke obscuring the story of the university’s involvement with “Eyes of Life” ­ a campaign that secured three thermal-imaging cameras for the Amherst Fire Department. Even prior to the 1999 tragedy in Worcester, Amherst and Hampshire colleges had each pledged $5,000 towards an $18,300 camera. UMass, however, orchestrated a “deal” whereby a rebuilt camera could be had for half-price. In other words, their “cooperative effort” consisted of a coupon.
Chancellor Scott’s comment that “the university is committed to employing its resources to benefit the community; in this case, our resources extend beyond mere dollars,” added insult to parsimony. Money spent on a good cause by concerned citizens and institutions denigrated as “mere” begs the question: If you have such a low opinion of “mere money” than why not contribute some like everyone else?

Larry Kelley ’83
Amherst

The writer owns the Amherst Athletic Club and chaired the “Eyes of Life” committee. The director of the UMass News Office responds:

THE UNIVERSITY’S CONTRIBUTION toward the purchase of an additional thermal-imaging camera for use by the Amherst Fire Department has been clearly stated. Through the efforts of Donald Robinson, director of environmental health and safety, the campus was able to negotiate a cost-savings of $12,000 for a second and more sophisticated model of thermal-imaging camera for use by the town.
That translates into $12,000 that did not have to be spent by anyone for the additional camera, thanks to the UMass contact. Many in Amherst, including the town’s fire chief, have publicly acknowledged the value of the university’s involvement and its very real contribution to this effort.

Barbara Pitoniak
Campus

I'll see your boycott and raise you...

So my long-time friend Vladimir Morales generated headlines over the past few days requesting the 'People's Republic of Amherst' boycott all things Arizona due to their recent legislation essentially mirroring federal immigration law--except of course for the enforcement part.

Since Vlad has been active over the past ten years trying to get legal immigrants the right to vote in local elections (something I have always supported on the floor of Amherst Town Meeting) it's no big surprise he would jump in to this current international frenzy.

Select Board Chair Stephanie O'Keeffe doesn't seem overly enthused about Amherst officially taking this up now as a cause celeb, as they are currently knee deep in annual Town Meeting and running a $60+ million enterprise takes precedence over symbolic meddling.

I was interviewing state Senator Stan Rosenberg this morning on another project and couldn't help but ask him about this recent dust up. Like Princess Stephanie, he does not think the Massachusetts state legislature will take up this crusade anytime soon because at the moment they are busy with issues that directly impact legal Massachusetts citizens.

Springfield Republican Reports




Recent note to Amherst Chamber of Commerce and Select Board from Kenneth Robinson:

"If the voters of Amherst want to elect people like comrade Morales to public office that is, or course, their business.

However, actions have consequences. If the Select Board votes to approve Morales' Boycott Arizona resolution I will implement my own Boycott Amherst policy.

I enjoy dining , upscale and casual, in Amherst. I like shopping local (especially at independent booksellers) and grabbing a coffee at a non-chain coffee house. But, I do not like subsidizing politically correct idiocy.

As a consumer I have plenty of choices where I spend my money. If Amherst wants to pass pointless, symbolic resolutions that I find offensive its businesses will not be receiving any support from me."

The pipes, the pipes are calling...

So besides hosting our 10th and 20th business founding anniversary party and the occasional visits I made earlier on while still a full-time Umass student, my most vividly memory about Charlie's Bar in downtown Amherst was the strategic role it played in the most heated political engagement of my entire career--the 'smoking ban in bars' battle.

Owner Rich Slobody was a long-time friend and one of my very first karate students joining up the day we opened in 1982. Rich is an experienced savvy businessman but also a law-an-order kind of guy who may grumble about the rules but follows them to the letter. He was also at the time a volunteer duly authorized Hampshire County deputy sheriff under my favorite cousin Sheriff Bob Garvey.

So in 1998 when the Amherst Health Department extended the smoking ban to bars and all Hell was breaking loose, Charlie's instantly conformed--the only bar in town to do so. Other bar owners carried on like that scene in Frankenstein where the villagers boisterously head toward the castle with pitchforks and torches in hand.

I instantly wrote an Amherst Bulletin column (one of many) in support of the ban and as a result was already receiving threatening Anon phone calls and a note written on a napkin left under the windshield wiper of my car.

At the time Dr. Valerie Steinberg was Board of Health chair and she had the typical small-frame runners physique. I made it a point to attend all the public meetings sitting in the front row in case things got physical, which in a few cases it almost did. The smell of alcohol and heated rhetoric makes for a disconcerting combination.

Town Meeting initially passed overwhelmingly an advisory article supporting the ban, but Town Manager Barry Del Castilho was less than enthusiastic and Select Board vice chair Hill Boss, a smoker, was downright rude.

Meanwhile Charlie's became the target of a boycott. Charlies's was the kind of bar you may start or finish a night of bar hopping rather than settle in for the night, so if you had other bars along the way suggesting they should be shunned for the good of the industry--it had impact.

Rich reported a loss of $10,000 that first summer because of a steep decline in patronage.

Another barowner filed a Town Meeting advisory article declaring the Board of Health ban went "too far" and variances should be allowed. The Select Board supported the article. After an hour of heated debate, it failed by almost 2-1. At that point even the wishy-washy Select Board came around.

And the Board of Health started playing hardball: issuing fines and pulling food permits which automatically voided the alcohol licenses issued by the Select Board. The resistance crumbled.

Rich sold the bar a few years ago and can't remember the last time I was there. But I'll always remember those gloomy dark days when the ban was besieged from all sides and it looked like the bullies would win. Charlie's was the only bright light.

And now they're--like all those clouds of smoking ban acrimony--just a memory.

With a little regret

So yeah, venerable Amherst Town Meeting--250 years plus--commences this evening and for only the second time since 1991 I will not be present.

After being elected with 3 or 4 write-in votes in 91' I took a brief hiatus during the 2004 Mayor/Council Charter battle (to replace Town Meeting) but have been an active participant ever since.

Not that I think I've made a difference per say. I always figured myself as the "loyal opposition," saying or doing things that lots of people think but don't have the guts to state publicly.

Stan Gawle, about the only other conservative in town, also resigned his Town Meeting position (I simply did not run for reelection) after the $1.68 million Override passed rather handily, also concerned that he was just whistling in the wind.

So Town Meeting will drone on over the next month or two without two fiscally conservative watchdogs--an endangered species in that body now bordering on extinction.

Fleeting Fame

So apparently Wikipedia doesn't set very high hurdles for inclusion as a "historical" or just plain "notable" figure living in town as none other than Andrew Churchill (no relation to Winston) just made both lists, with his only cited claim to fame that he served on the School Committee until 2010.

No mention of course that under his watch the School Committee convinced Amherst Town Meeting to purchase two portable classrooms for Mark's Meadow Elementary School (where he had a child attending) for $215,000 that were never actually used for classrooms and will be auctioned as "surplus" at great loss.

Or that he rubber stamped the hiring of interim co-superintendents Alton Sprague and his wife Helen Vivian for $125,000 saying ""The Vivian/Sprague team really seemed to understand what we need in an interim superintendent - keep the trains running, keep communications open with the community, keep moving forward on our existing goals, and set things up well for the permanent superintendent next year."

The Co-Supers flew the coop four months early due to medical issues yet still collected full pay for the entire one-year contract. And as for keeping "communications open with the community" Mr. Sprague brusquely rejected the suggestion of an on-line suggestion box saying that in his 40 years of education experience "nothing good has come from a suggestion box."

During the School Committee vote on the suggestion box issue Mr. Decisive distinguished himself by voting No, but admitted: "I guess I'm going to vote against it, even though I support it, even though that's lame."

Churchill was also chair of the Amherst School Committee when the Regional Committee hired Alberto Rodriguez at 20% over the previous Superintendent and he too lasted only 8 months, but is still collecting his generous salary with checks being mailed to Florida.

And no mention that Andy co-writes a bland, milktoast, snoozer of a column for the venerable Amherst Bulletin--although that column has recently been axed.

Since the standards to inclusion now seem somewhat diminished, I'll just nominate my own person, Bill Elsasser. At least his paranoid schizophrenia has no agenda.



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